Various medical procedures involve the insertion of one or more of a physician's fingers into openings in the patient's body. This is frequently required in the practice of obstetrics, gynecology and proctology among other examples.
The medical practitioner wears a glove during such procedures and in many cases one or more fingers of the glove are lubricated with a gel or the like to facilitate entry into the body opening and to reduce discomfort of the patient. The glove is formed of very thin fluid impervious material, such as latex or the like, to minimize impairment of the practitioner's tactile sensitivity.
The glove must often be sterile in order to prevent introduction of infectious organisms into the patient's body during certain procedures. Such procedures can be undesirably complicated if the sterilizing operation must be performed by medical personnel just prior to use of the glove. Consequently, such gloves are pre-sterilized and sealed into a sterilized package by the manufacturer.
This form of packaging simplifies procedures in that the medical personnel need not take any further steps to sterilize the glove but prior packages of this kind do not address other complications that are encountered in connection with the use of such gloves.
It has been necessary, for example, to have a container of lubricating gel or the like on hand and the container must be opened and reclosed in the process of lubricating the glove. Handling of the gel container can result in contamination of the sterile glove. Inadvertent deposition of the sticky gel on objects other than the glove can also be a problem.
The typically tight and clinging medical glove can also be difficult to put on. The process can be expedited by having another person, such as a nurse, hold the glove open while the physician's hand is being inserted into the glove but this is not always a practical solution. An additional person may not be readily available or an available person may have other pressing activities to perform in connection with the medical procedure.
The present invention is directed to overcoming one or more of the problems discussed above.